The Office for Civil Rights has reached a settlement
agreement with the Schenectady City School District in regard to its special
education program. OCR found that
the district was enrolling a disproportionate number of black and Latino
students enrolled in special education. For
instance, 49 percent of the students classified as emotionally disturbed were
African American, while African Americans were only 35 percent of the overall
student population. Twenty-three percent of students classified as learning
disabled were Latino, while Latinos were only 16 percent of the overall student
population.

OCR found that the disparity stemmed from the lack of standardized
criteria for referring students to special education. For instance, the district did not even have Spanish
language materials with which to evaluate English Language Learners, which is specifically required by federal law. OCR also found that the approach to special
education identification differed from teacher to teacher and school to school. One of the more obvious problems was in regard to racially
diverse classrooms, where it was often the case that teachers only referred minority students for special
education. Finally, the district did not
have monitoring system in place to gauge whether its special education system
was working appropriately.

The settlement agreement--which OCR credited the district
for actively collaborating on--calls for the district to hire an outside
expert, to develop a uniform screening process, to create building level teams
that manage the process, to offer continuing professional development, and to
review its existing special education evaluations. The full agreement is available here.

Those familiar with special education disparities might wonder
why this district drew OCR’s attention.
In comparison to many other districts, the disparities are not that
high. The question then is, if this
district is in violation, are hundreds or thousands of others as well? Will OCR take action against them? The answer is probably not. The disparities do not appear to be the legal primary trigger here. Rather, the
district’s failure to have basic procedures in place made this an easy case for
OCR. The lack of procedures, of course,
helps create the disparity and, thus, gives OCR a firm ground upon which to
act. But when a district has the correct
procedures in place, making the case for a violation becomes more
difficult. Disparities alone rarely
amount to a violation. In short, big win
for special education students in Schenectady, but this one is unlikely to have
ripple effects.